What books have you gone back and read a second time or more?

[Muse]

Any particular Book or Books you enjoy the most? I have always loved Ecclesiastes and Revelation and the Psalms.

Genesis, Exodus, Matthew, MarkLuke, John and Revelation from what I can recall.

 

[deec77]

It's an interesting time in history, if that doesn't sound too glib. I can't imagine how utterly terrifying it must have been to be an infantryman, or a civilian, when the artillery and bombs are falling.

The descriptions of the firestorm in various cities are utterly horrific.

My mom she was five.... she got to come here cause her dad, the jerk, that he was, was a US citizen by birth whose family moved back to Poland. He waited until he got here and got settled, on my great grandparents, on my mother’s sides, dime, it was an arranged married. Don’t even get me started... I never met either my mothers, mother my grandmother, my babcia, she died when my mom was 15 or my dziadek who abandoned his family once he got here. She and my dad, and both their moms and dads were Polish immigrants and have some really amazing stories.....It was a really interesting and sad time for those involved. My SILs is a Polish Jew we both married into an Irish Catholic family lol...It’s hard to explain.....

~Dee~

 

[Roberto71]

Any particular Book or Books you enjoy the most? I have always loved Ecclesiastes and Revelation and the Psalms.

Forget the King James Bible, I prefer the Rick James Bible myself; there's far more morality in it!

 

[Beaglebay]

To Kill A Mockingbird
Of Mice and Men
Gifts From the Sea
The Little Prince
The Prophet
The Mists of Avalon
The Tragedy of Macbeth
Ramona the Pest
The Beautiful Jim Key
Sgt Reckless
The $80 Champion
Answered Prayers
Music For Chameleons
A Confederacy of Dunces

Love fantasy/horror anthologies as well.

 

[Flagg the Wanderer]

The Dark Tower series, which I've read through twice, and read the early books significantly more. This is worth reading (along with the associated connected novels) for the sheer scale of the ambition of the project. It's no exaggeration to say that I have never engaged with a project that was more ambitious. That said, you can tell that King got nervous about dying with the series unfinished and rushed to the ending. Books 2-4, when the project was obviously starting to cohere in his head, are brilliant. Books 5 & 6 are fascinating for different reasons, when the broad conceit of the project comes into focus in-world, and events in King's real life come into conflict with it. Also, seemingly "sideline" events from Book 1 and Book 3, written more than a decade apart, come together to be core to the plot in a jawdropping holycrap moment that he either planned over 30 years or pieced together in insane serendipity...or his subconscious was working overtome. Book 7 is a tragic clusterfuck. Book 1 is outstanding in a totally different way from the rest of the series, where the overall picture was not clear to him, but he used the imagery and broad concept as a canvas and seems to be testing whether her can write literature, not just stories. Many people get bored and bail on Book 1.

 

[Phil Elliott]

While I need to read more of the classics I have to say I have re-read many Steven King books. The man is a national treasure and made me scream aloud in the afternoon of a sunny day when someone sneezed and startled the crap out of me during "Salems Lot".

Read all of King's earlier works. But, your comment about "Salem's Lot" resonated with me. I've read hundreds of books and I read that one decades ago, yet I remember being literally scared out of my wits reading that book. By myself, late at night...

 

[TipRoast]

The Dark Tower series, which I've read through twice, and read the early books significantly more. This is worth reading (along with the associated connected novels) for the sheer scale of the ambition of the project. It's no exaggeration to say that I have never engaged with a project that was more ambitious. That said, you can tell that King got nervous about dying with the series unfinished and rushed to the ending. Books 2-4, when the project was obviously starting to cohere in his head, are brilliant. Books 5 & 6 are fascinating for different reasons, when the broad conceit of the project comes into focus in-world, and events in King's real life come into conflict with it. Also, seemingly "sideline" events from Book 1 and Book 3, written more than a decade apart, come together to be core to the plot in a jawdropping holycrap moment that he either planned over 30 years or pieced together in insane serendipity...or his subconscious was working overtome. Book 7 is a tragic clusterfuck. Book 1 is outstanding in a totally different way from the rest of the series, where the overall picture was not clear to him, but he used the imagery and broad concept as a canvas and seems to be testing whether her can write literature, not just stories. Many people get bored and bail on Book 1.

I haven't read much King, just the story about the kids that start walking in Maine and finish up (a few of them) near Boston.

But the next time I feel like reading a long series, I will pick up The Dark Tower series.

I am currently re-reading Pierce Brown's Red Rising series, in preparation for the publication of book six.

 

[fulltilt]

The Dark Tower series, which I've read through twice, and read the early books significantly more. This is worth reading (along with the associated connected novels) for the sheer scale of the ambition of the project. It's no exaggeration to say that I have never engaged with a project that was more ambitious. That said, you can tell that King got nervous about dying with the series unfinished and rushed to the ending. Books 2-4, when the project was obviously starting to cohere in his head, are brilliant. Books 5 & 6 are fascinating for different reasons, when the broad conceit of the project comes into focus in-world, and events in King's real life come into conflict with it. Also, seemingly "sideline" events from Book 1 and Book 3, written more than a decade apart, come together to be core to the plot in a jawdropping holycrap moment that he either planned over 30 years or pieced together in insane serendipity...or his subconscious was working overtome. Book 7 is a tragic clusterfuck. Book 1 is outstanding in a totally different way from the rest of the series, where the overall picture was not clear to him, but he used the imagery and broad concept as a canvas and seems to be testing whether her can write literature, not just stories. Many people get bored and bail on Book 1.

Like with the ending The Stand. I remember being incredibly pissed I had invested 800 pages and a nuke blows up Vegas. I'm like you have got to be kidding me. Jhc. My first King was Firestarter and he hooked me bad. Another favorite is the short story The Running Man written under the Bachman name. Ben Richards is one of my absolute favorite King characters.

 

[Hawg73]

Read all of King's earlier works. But, your comment about "Salem's Lot" resonated with me. I've read hundreds of books and I read that one decades ago, yet I remember being literally scared out of my wits reading that book. By myself, late at night...

Story time.

I was 18 and decided to rent a beach house in Scituate for the offseason and figured the more roommates, the cheaper the rent was. There were 5 of us.

So, 3 of us decided to head into Boston on a Saturday night, but "Webster" didn't feel like it and stayed in.

Anyhow, we drank our brains out in town and arrived back at about 3AM in a sleet storm and discovered that nobody thought to bring a house key
with us. We knocked and yelled for a long while and there was no answer. Mike decides to climb up the icy roof to the 2nd floor, a very scary climb, and
knock on Web's window to wake him up. Nothing happened for the longest time. Then, we could hear what sounded like a long conversation, but couldn't
figure out what was taking so long, but, at long last, the window opened and Mike, and we, were in.

Web, now wide awake, looked totally freaked out and explained that he went up to bed with a joint, a carton of chocolate milk and a copy of Salem's Lot which he
was hooked on. He had just read the scene where Danny Glick (a young vampire) is knocking on his friend's window to turn him into a vampire and Web eventually gets
tired and falls asleep with the milk in one hand and the book open on his chest. He wakes up in a pool of chocolate milk from the loud knocking on his 2nd floor
window and he knows nobody could possibly be out there, never mind in the middle of a stormy night and, of course, he was convinced Mike was a vampire trying
to get in to suck his blood. He was 100% convinced for quite a while and we've harassed him about that night ever since.

True story.

 

[Phil Elliott]

Story time.

I was 18 and decided to rent a beach house in Scituate for the offseason and figured the more roommates, the cheaper the rent was. There were 5 of us.

So, 3 of us decided to head into Boston on a Saturday night, but "Webster" didn't feel like it and stayed in.

Anyhow, we drank our brains out in town and arrived back at about 3AM in a sleet storm and discovered that nobody thought to bring a house key
with us. We knocked and yelled for a long while and there was no answer. Mike decides to climb up the icy roof to the 2nd floor, a very scary climb, and
knock on Web's window to wake him up. Nothing happened for the longest time. Then, we could hear what sounded like a long conversation, but couldn't
figure out what was taking so long, but, at long last, the window opened and Mike, and we, were in.

Web, now wide awake, looked totally freaked out and explained that he went up to bed with a joint, a carton of chocolate milk and a copy of Salem's Lot which he
was hooked on. He had just read the scene where Danny Glick (a young vampire) is knocking on his friend's window to turn him into a vampire and Web eventually gets
tired and falls asleep with the milk in one hand and the book open on his chest. He wakes up in a pool of chocolate milk from the loud knocking on his 2nd floor
window and he knows nobody could possibly be out there, never mind in the middle of a stormy night and, of course, he was convinced Mike was a vampire trying
to get in to suck his blood. He was 100% convinced for quite a while and we've harassed him about that night ever since.

True story.

 

[Flagg the Wanderer]

I haven't read much King, just the story about the kids that start walking in Maine and finish up (a few of them) near Boston.

But the next time I feel like reading a long series, I will pick up The Dark Tower series.

I am currently re-reading Pierce Brown's Red Rising series, in preparation for the publication of book six.

The Long Walk. A good one. I've always felt King was at his best when the fear/monsters were internal. The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon. Delores Claiborne. And possibly the best example of this, Rage. But good luck finding a copy of that one!

 

[Flagg the Wanderer]

Story time.

I was 18 and decided to rent a beach house in Scituate for the offseason and figured the more roommates, the cheaper the rent was. There were 5 of us.

So, 3 of us decided to head into Boston on a Saturday night, but "Webster" didn't feel like it and stayed in.

Anyhow, we drank our brains out in town and arrived back at about 3AM in a sleet storm and discovered that nobody thought to bring a house key
with us. We knocked and yelled for a long while and there was no answer. Mike decides to climb up the icy roof to the 2nd floor, a very scary climb, and
knock on Web's window to wake him up. Nothing happened for the longest time. Then, we could hear what sounded like a long conversation, but couldn't
figure out what was taking so long, but, at long last, the window opened and Mike, and we, were in.

Web, now wide awake, looked totally freaked out and explained that he went up to bed with a joint, a carton of chocolate milk and a copy of Salem's Lot which he
was hooked on. He had just read the scene where Danny Glick (a young vampire) is knocking on his friend's window to turn him into a vampire and Web eventually gets
tired and falls asleep with the milk in one hand and the book open on his chest. He wakes up in a pool of chocolate milk from the loud knocking on his 2nd floor
window and he knows nobody could possibly be out there, never mind in the middle of a stormy night and, of course, he was convinced Mike was a vampire trying
to get in to suck his blood. He was 100% convinced for quite a while and we've harassed him about that night ever since.

True story.

Is "Webster" an extremely short black child?

 

[Hawg73]

Is "Webster" an extremely short black child?

No. He was an average-sized white guy named Bill from the era whose major character flaw was using big words that he often didn't understand in order to impress people. IOW, he was a total sesquipedalian, which is my favorite word ever. Hence, he was known far and wide as "Webster".

Where I grew up nobody said predictable, boring things when there was an opportunity to get creative, so, for instance; "shut the window" became "squeeze the pneumonia hatch". We had sort of a dialect. It was a sub-culture thing that just sort of sprang up in my low-rent neighborhood full of miscreants who were often high as lab rats. Myself included.

The Long Walk. A good one. I've always felt King was at his best when the fear/monsters were internal. The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon. Delores Claiborne. And possibly the best example of this, Rage. But good luck finding a copy of that one!

I recently listened to the audiobook and thought it was engrossing. For those unfamiliar, it concerns an angry, disillusioned student who commits murder and holds his class hostage, but somehow
King (writing as Bachman) manages to make him a realistic, even sympathetic, character, but the whole topic is taboo today for obvious reasons.




View: https://youtu.be/dssNy_Fmp54

 

[fulltilt]

The Long Walk. A good one. I've always felt King was at his best when the fear/monsters were internal. The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon. Delores Claiborne. And possibly the best example of this, Rage. But good luck finding a copy of that one!

Apt pupil comes to mind. King really covered a lot of ground but he was breathtaling at putting scary dark stuff in the middle of the neighborhood you grew up in..

 

[Muse]

Apt pupil comes to mind. King really covered a lot of ground but he was breathtaling at putting scary dark stuff in the middle of the neighborhood you grew up in..

Was?


Is.

 

[fulltilt]

Was?


Is.

I stand corrected!

 

[Mazz22]

Story time.

I was 18 and decided to rent a beach house in Scituate for the offseason and figured the more roommates, the cheaper the rent was. There were 5 of us.

So, 3 of us decided to head into Boston on a Saturday night, but "Webster" didn't feel like it and stayed in.

Anyhow, we drank our brains out in town and arrived back at about 3AM in a sleet storm and discovered that nobody thought to bring a house key
with us. We knocked and yelled for a long while and there was no answer. Mike decides to climb up the icy roof to the 2nd floor, a very scary climb, and
knock on Web's window to wake him up. Nothing happened for the longest time. Then, we could hear what sounded like a long conversation, but couldn't
figure out what was taking so long, but, at long last, the window opened and Mike, and we, were in.

Web, now wide awake, looked totally freaked out and explained that he went up to bed with a joint, a carton of chocolate milk and a copy of Salem's Lot which he
was hooked on. He had just read the scene where Danny Glick (a young vampire) is knocking on his friend's window to turn him into a vampire and Web eventually gets
tired and falls asleep with the milk in one hand and the book open on his chest. He wakes up in a pool of chocolate milk from the loud knocking on his 2nd floor
window and he knows nobody could possibly be out there, never mind in the middle of a stormy night and, of course, he was convinced Mike was a vampire trying
to get in to suck his blood. He was 100% convinced for quite a while and we've harassed him about that night ever since.

True story.

Are you a writer? If not, you should be. That was fantastic story telling.